The initiative to permanently keep an additional penny on the sales tax recently secured the backing of a group of company executives in northern Arizona, but the endorsement also highlighted a polarized business community.

On a recent Monday morning, Tim O’Malley sat in a Sunnyslope diner sipping coffee and peppering his Republican elected officials with questions about education funding — sounding more like a well-informed heckler than a former longtime member of the Republican Party.

Republican legislative candidates in hotly-contested races have on the whole stockpiled a bigger war chest than Democrats as November approaches, finance reports filed with the Secretary of State show.

National Democrats are boosting their investment in Arizona's Senate race to replace retiring Sen. Jon Kyl, another sign that the race between Republican Jeff Flake and Democrat Richard Carmona is competitive.

Republican Ethan Orr spent the first half of his life as a Democrat, volunteering for the party on political campaigns, including Bill Clinton’s first presidential run in 1992 and Eddie Basha’s run for Arizona governor in 1994.